Sunday, September 20, 2009

As you've probably gathered, Loretta and I really, really like historic dress. We're constantly sending links back and forth that show this 19th c. gown or that 17th c. pair of slippers, because this is the kind of stuff that inspires us. It also distracts us a lot, too, but whatever.

Sometimes, though, we come across examples of historic clothing that we'd (almost) rather not see. This happened recently when the Royal Ceremonial Dress Collection, housed in Kensington Palace, proudly announced their latest acquisition: a pair of drawers that had once belonged to Queen Victoria (1819-1901). They are, ah, large. Very large. Seems that by the 1890s, Her Majesty – who was five feet tall on a good day – was sporting a 56" waist.

Poor Queen Victoria! It's hard to imagine her horrified reaction to such a press release. But since you're probably every bit as curious as we were, here's the whole story plus the picture of two curators (yes, it took two) displaying the royal undies.

That's not fair! It would also take two people to hold out Paris Hilton's bra and thong if they had to show them horizontally.

I have seen Queen Victoria's coronation dress and wedding dress, and she had a tiny waist in 1838 and 1840. In 1997 they had an exhibition of the clothes of Princess Charlotte and Queen Victoria in the Museum of London, that's where I saw them. Princess Charlotte's wedding dress was on display too. There's a catalogue of the exhibition called In Royal Fashion with very good colour photographs.Even in old age Queen Victoria was not spectacularly fat, when you see her dresses, though she was rather dumpy. And let's face it, menopause is making my waist disappear too, and I haven't borne nine children.

I'm quite surprised at the price of 600 pounds paid for two items of underwear. I remember a pair of Queen Victoria's drawers turning up once on the Antiques Road Show, and the owner was told there were many of these floating about, and they were therefore not worth much. That is many years ago, though.

Queen Victoria WAS tiny when she married, and though all those children plus time did take a toll on her, I suspect that the waist size of the drawers isn't necessarily the same as her own. But the story (and the picture) got picked up by media all over the world, so I guess if the curators wanted attention for their collection, they did get it.

To be honest, I found some of the other items from the collection to be much more interesting -- click through the pix on the link to see everything from Princess Diana's honeymoon suit to William III's stockings.

Considering how tightly corseted the upper part of Victoria's body always was, maybe she just preferred to be comfy and roomy below. Given how voluminous the skirts were, esp. during the crinoline era, maybe that was the only comfortable part of her entire wardrobe.

And yes, Jane O, I love the silver mantua, too. Interesting story about how they had to *fight* to keep it in the UK, when those mean old Americans from the Metropolitan Museum of Art want to carry it off to NYC.

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A Polite Explanation

There’s a big difference in how we use history. But we’re equally nuts about it. To us, the everyday details of life in the past are things to talk about, ponder, make fun of -- much in the way normal people talk about their favorite reality show.

We talk about who’s wearing what and who’s sleeping with whom. We try to sort out rumor or myth from fact. We thought there must be at least three other people out there who think history’s fascinating and fun, too. This blog is for them.